Scheduled Report Delivery: Statuses, History, and Sending
Scheduled Report Delivery: Statuses, History, and Sending
This guide explains how scheduled reports are delivered by email, what each delivery status means, where to find your report history, and how to send or test a report. It also flags a few cases where a report can appear "Ready" but not actually reach a recipient's inbox.
How delivery works
Scheduled reports run automatically once per day at 00:00 UTC. For each run, NinjaCat:
- Generates the report.
- Queues it for delivery.
- Emails it to the recipients configured on the report, using your agency's SMTP (email) configuration.
Because delivery depends on your SMTP configuration, some delivery outcomes happen outside NinjaCat's visibility. The sections below explain what you can and can't see.
Delivery and generation statuses
You'll see these statuses on the Scheduled Reports list. They describe how a report run went.
| Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| Ready (also shown as "Report Ready") | The report generated successfully. Important: "Ready" describes generation, not delivery. A report can show Ready and still not have been emailed — see When a report shows "Ready" but isn't emailed. |
| Sent | The mail server accepted the message. Note this carefully: "Sent" means your mail server accepted the email for delivery — it is not a guarantee the email reached the recipient's inbox. Bounces and downstream rejections are not tracked by NinjaCat. If a recipient says they didn't get the report, check your SMTP server logs and the recipient address. |
| Data Error | A non-critical problem occurred while generating the report. You can open the error to view details and see what went wrong. |
| Critical Error | The report run failed. You can open the error to view details. |
| Email Error | The email send failed after 3 automatic retries. Unlike Data Error and Critical Error, Email Error currently shows only as a status badge — there is no detailed error view for it. See What to do about an Email Error. |
What to do about an Email Error
Because no detailed message is shown for Email Error, work through these steps:
- Re-send or re-run the report using the Send action (see Sending a report) to try delivery again.
- Check your SMTP / email configuration in Agency Settings → Email Configurations for authentication, host/port, or connectivity issues.
- Verify the recipient addresses on the report are correct and able to receive mail.
- If sends keep failing, confirm the report isn't unusually large (very large reports can be rejected by the mail server — see below).
When a report shows "Ready" but isn't emailed
A report can generate successfully and show Ready without an email ever going out. Watch for these cases:
- Automatic reports with no data are skipped silently. If a scheduled (automatic) report generates with zero data, no email is sent and no error is raised — the status simply shows Ready.
- Reports set to email mode "None" are not emailed. If the report's email delivery mode is set to None, it will generate and show Ready, but nothing is sent.
- Oversized reports can fail at the mail server without a size warning. A very large report may be rejected during sending. NinjaCat does not surface a size-specific warning; these typically land as an Email Error.
If recipients report a missing report but the status shows Ready, check whether the report had data, confirm the email delivery mode isn't set to None, and use Send to deliver it manually.
Finding your report history
NinjaCat does not have a view called "Delivery History" or "Delivery Log," and per-recipient delivery outcomes (including bounce tracking) are not available. There are two places to look, and it's important to know what each one shows:
- View History — a list of the report files that have been generated, so you can review or download them. Its columns are Created On, Review, and Download. This is a record of generated files, not a record of delivery outcomes.
- Workflow Manager — a panel with Active and Historical views showing report runs. This is report-level information (how runs progressed), not per-recipient delivery status.
Neither view tells you whether an individual recipient received the email. To confirm delivery, rely on the status (keeping the "Sent" = accepted, not guaranteed caveat in mind) and, when needed, your SMTP server logs.
Sending a report
There are two separate controls, and they do different things. Please don't confuse them — one sends a real report to live recipients.
1. Send (per report) — sends to your real recipients
On the Scheduled Reports page, the report's context menu includes a Send action. This sends the most recently generated report to the report's actual configured recipients (your live clients). It can optionally mark the report as Sent.
This is a real send to live recipients — it is not a test. Use it only when you intend for the configured recipients to receive the report.
2. Send Test Email (SMTP check) — does not send a report
Under Agency Settings → Email Configurations, the Send Test Email control verifies that your SMTP connection is working. It does not send a report — it only confirms that email settings are configured correctly.
There is no "test send to myself" for a report. To check email settings, use Send Test Email (SMTP). To deliver an actual report, use the Send action, understanding it goes to the real recipients.
Quick reference
- Reports run daily at 00:00 UTC.
- Ready = generated, not necessarily emailed. Sent = accepted by the mail server, not guaranteed delivered.
- Email Error = failed after 3 retries, with no detailed message; re-send, check SMTP, check recipients.
- No-data automatic reports, email mode None, and oversized reports are the common "looks fine but didn't arrive" cases.
- View History = generated files; Workflow Manager (Active/Historical) = report-level runs. Neither shows per-recipient delivery.
- Send = real send to live recipients. Send Test Email = SMTP check only.
Updated about 2 hours ago